I'm trying to make our print production manager's life easier and I'm having trouble pulling text files into Quark with styles intact. I would like Quark to import the text and automatically apply the relevant styles.

I tried using rtf files and Microsoft Word styles. If I made a Microsoft Word style named "Headline" with 7 pt. XB Futura ExtraBold text, Quark would import the files with 7 pt. XB Futura ExtraBold text, but Quark would not apply the corresponding Quark style named "Headline"

I found an article that suggested using @tags within plain text files at http://www.tek-tips.com/viewthread.cfm?qid=657109. Unfortunately, when I tried that, it simply imported the words "@Headline:" instead of applying the headline style in Quark. If you have any advice on how to get text files to import into Quark with the relevant quark styles intact, I would appreciate it. (Don't say switch to InDesign, I tried to sell that and not everyone is as enthusiastic about the idea as I am, lol)

For what it's worth, I have a script that is pulling info into the text files using Excel and Microsoft Word. (posted below in case anyone is curious). Aside from getting the formatting to work the way I want it to, the script works perfectly. Once I figure out how to work with imported text and styles in Quark, I'll add the relevant parts to the script and post the final script in the scripting section.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------PROMPTING THE USER TO SELECT THE FOLDER WITH THE EXCEL FILES ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

with timeout of 900 seconds

--Displaying a prompt asking the user to select the excel file with the information set excel_folder to choose folder with prompt "Select the folder with the excel files"

tell application "Finder" to set excel_file_list to (every file of folder excel_folder whose name extension contains "xls") as alias list

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- --GETTING INFO FROM EACH EXCEL ROW TO PASTE INTO WORD ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

--Repeating with every used row set the_start_row to 2 tell application "Microsoft Excel" tell active sheet repeat with i from 1 to count of rows of used range set current_row to i

--Setting the cell address for each info field set sku_number_cell to "E" & current_row as string set mfg_number_cell to "F" & current_row as string set vendor_cell to "G" & current_row as string set description_cell to "H" & current_row as string set long_description_cell to "W" & current_row as string set the_specs_cell to "X" & current_row as string set the_url_cell to "Y" & current_row as string

--Getting the values from every cell address if current_row is greater than or equal to the_start_row then set sku_number to value of cell sku_number_cell as string set mfg_number to value of cell mfg_number_cell as string set the_vendor to value of cell vendor_cell as string set the_description to value of cell description_cell as string set long_description to value of cell long_description_cell set the_specs to value of cell the_specs_cell set the_url to value of cell the_url_cell

--Doctoring the vendor name if it contains "/" if the_vendor contains "/" then set astid to AppleScript's text item delimiters set AppleScript's text item delimiters to "/" set text_items to text items of the_vendor set AppleScript's text item delimiters to "_" set the_vendor to text_items as Unicode text set AppleScript's text item delimiters to astid end if

--Setting the path in which to save the word document set desktop_folder to path to desktop as string set the output_path to desktop_folder & sku_number & "_" & the_vendor & ".rtf"

--Inserting/pasting that info into Word insert text product_text at beginning of text object of active document

--Creating the basic paragraph style set paragraph_style to make new Word style at active document with properties ¬ {name local:"A Basic Price", style type:style type paragraph} set line spacing of paragraph format of paragraph_style to "20" set alignment of paragraph format of paragraph_style to align paragraph center set space after of paragraph format of paragraph_style to "0.035" set hyphenation to false

--Creating the Headline Character Style set headling_style to make new Word style at active document with properties ¬ {name local:"Headline", style type:style type character} set name of font object of headling_style to "XB Futura ExtraBold" set font size of font object of headling_style to "7"

--Applying Paragaph Style set style of text object of paragraph 1 of selection to paragraph_style

--Overwriting file if it already exists on error try set output_file to output_path as alias tell application "Finder" if exists output_file then delete file output_file tell application "Microsoft Word" to save as active document file name output_path file format format rtf end if end tell end try end try

tell active document to close saving no

end tell

log output_path

end if end repeat end tell end tell end repeatend timeout------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------